EDITORS' CORNER
OPINION: ‘Viewpoint diversity’ initiative likely to do little to change the culture on campus, but professors still worried
Some Harvard University professors are worried the school might hire a few token conservatives under a “viewpoint diversity” initiative.
But given the school’s deep seated problems with academic freedom and open debate, it’s unlikely anything of consequence will even happen.
Officials are reportedly asking top donors for $10 million gifts to endow professors who will contribute to “viewpoint diversity,” according to The Harvard Crimson. The university faculty is reportedly 82 percent liberal.
“If successful, the funding could bring dozens of faculty members to campus and drastically shift Harvard’s academic makeup,” the student newspaper reported.
Harvard Provost John Manning “hoped to recruit between 20 and 30 faculty connected to the initiative,” The Crimson reported, based on an unnamed source.
The chance that the university might add 30 new professors, who would represent just one percent of all instructors at the school, is a source of concern for some on campus.
“The spirit behind these appointments will only intensify deep suspicions about the impartiality of the ad hoc process, not to mention diminishing trust in the institution, which might be seen as an extension of various industries associated with the names of the donors,” classics Professor Richard Thomas told the student newspaper.
“Any expansion of the faculty is to be welcomed – but I don’t think we need to target ‘conservative’ professors to bring viewpoint diversity into our classrooms,” Jason Ur, an anthropologist, said.
English Professor Stephanie Burt expressed a mixed view:
If Harvard is setting out to hire people who always vote Republican or support Trump, I think that’s a mistake, and it won’t end well.
If Harvard is setting out to hire people who might describe themselves as philosophically conservative or people who might describe themselves as radical in unusual ways, or people doing high quality, intellectually robust work that is not represented here, I’m not against that.
But one reason Harvard is likely to fail, is that it does not have a good track record of protecting its center-right academics – nor even those who depart slightly from leftist orthodoxy.
Consider law Professor Mark Ramseyer. He wrote an academic paper challenging the narrative that Korean women were forced by the Japanese to act as prostitutes, or “comfort women,” during World War II.
A fairly dry topic that is only made slightly interesting because it relates to sex, the paper drew condemnation both from inside and outside the academia, including two Harvard professors who demanded a retraction of Ramseyer’s academic paper.
Viewpoint diversity is also not appreciated much in the engineering school, either.
In 2021, Dean Francis Doyle canceled a class on innovative policing tactics, led by decorated military veteran Kit Parker. The scholar was set to teach a class on how to reduce crime.
Unfortunately, Doyle let himself get bullied by a police abolitionist graduate student into cancelling the class, as The Fix previously reported.
Even the “Council on Academic Freedom,” led by Steven Pinker, cannot be expected to stand up against bully campaigns.
In 2023, activists targeted Harvard Professor Jody Freeman, a former climate adviser to President Barack Obama, for serving on the board of ConocoPhillips.
Fossil Fuel Divest Harvard targeted Freeman, who had previously explained she hoped to use her role to effect positive environmental changes.
But asked for comment, the “Council on Academic Freedom” largely brushed off concerns or mused openly about ignoring College Fix questions.
“My own view is this is not really an academic freedom question,” Professor Jeannie Gersen told The Fix. “I agree,” Professor Jeffrey Flier responded to Gersen’s group response. Professor Jane Kamensky agreed as well.
The best-case scenario then is that Harvard finds a couple professors to teach about Plato or Aristotle or Tocqueville in a 100-level intro to political theory class, and the reigning liberal regime stays in place.
No real shake up will happen, but at least university leadership and “academic freedom” advocates will be able to feel good about themselves and pat themselves on the back.
MORE: Nearly half of UW-Madison faculty ‘less likely’ to hire conservative faculty, survey says
